I am a retired college faculty in Philosophy, with specializations in Ethics, Socio-political Theory and Rational Choice/Decision Theory. My teaching focus was on Business Ethics, Medical Ethics and Logic. After retirement I freelanced as a Grant Writer/Fund Raising Consultant. I have taught at... More

The end of the year is just a few days away (four, as I write this), and with only three-and-a-half days trading this week, and one-and-a-half next week (before the New Year), I've opted to postpone this week's report and save it for next week - hopefully as an article.

Some things to consider in the interim:

It actually looks like the Dogs of the Dow will beat the Dow PIC portfolio. Two or three hundred basic points is enough of a difference to matter. It remains to be seen, however, whether the Dogs will beat the Dow itself.

the PIC portfolio will beat the Dogs the S&P 500, possibly by the same margin as is involved in the Dow competition. The PIC should also beat the S&P itself, but it might be close.

It does look like the S&P PIC portfolio will beat the Dogs of the Dow. This will be a close race, but given the past couple of weeks, the S&P has done somewhat better than the Dow, so I give the edge to the PICs to beat the Dogs.

What really disappoints me is the performance of ETFs that track the two indexes: they are all beating - or very close to beating - the Dogs and the PICs of both indexes.

To sum up, the PICs have not done badly, and neither have the Dogs. There won't be quite the superior performance of the Dogs of the Dow as history would have it, which is strange, given that this has been a very nicely performing year, all told.

What happens next? I am not going to follow the Dogs next year - I'll leave that up to my colleagues, such as Miz Magic DiviDogs.

I will be expanding how I cover the PICs, however. As a teaser, let me say that I set up a new PIC portfolio for both the Dow and the S&P, both starting on July 1. Since then, the S&P PICs have made a total return of more than 18%. PICs may not be a 12-month hold'em. I will be tracking a variety of alternatives to see if it is possible to pin down a cycle for refreshing the portfolios.

Anticipation of numbers seemed to keep the market suppressed this past week, with a recovery on Friday that was much welcomed. I still don't get why people seem so fixated on QE - the tapering is a decision that has been made, and it's just a question of when. To sit and fret about it in the hopes that fretting about it will keep it away is a waste of good fretting.

The Dow:

(click to enlarge)

The Dogs kept in place while the PIC portfolio dropped back by just a few basis points.IBM (NYSE:IBM) is about the only worry here.

The S&P 500:

(click to enlarge)

Nothing much has changed here, either, although the S&P itself is increasing its lead over both of the portfolios.

Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.

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